


you are the songs i dreamt (but never sung)

by bellairestrella



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series), Hindu Religions & Lore, In Control with Kelsey (Web Series), Watcher Entertainment
Genre: Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, F/M, Happy Ending, POV First Person, Past Tense, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-12 09:55:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22057255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellairestrella/pseuds/bellairestrella
Summary: Girl meets boy. Girl marries boy. Boy dies. Girl saves boy from death.(Also a retelling of the Ruru and Priyamvada story.)
Relationships: Kelsey Impicciche/Shane Madej
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3
Collections: RareBuzzShips Holiday Event





	you are the songs i dreamt (but never sung)

**Author's Note:**

> This is a fic I’ve rewritten to fit the parameters for the **rarebuzzships** holiday event. (Even though it utilizes one prompt…oops.) The story is set in the forest regions of the Himalayas in India. And it’s based on an Indian legend; I added some twists to it. There's more info on the exact legend [here](https://devdutt.com/articles/return-of-the-dead-wife/). For the record, I’m Indian myself so there isn’t any appropriation risk.
> 
> Title comes from Sadakichi Hartmann’s poem “Drifting Flowers of the Sea.” And this is self-edited, so any mistakes that remain are my own. 
> 
> (Also, if you’re any of the non immortals named in this fic, please click the back button and read something else! I mean it.)
> 
> All right, enough of my rambling.

I used to believe that death was formidable, something to dread and be afraid of. Yet I couldn't escape it, even if I tried with all my might and heart. It was looming, seeming closer and closer to me every second, and I wanted to push it farther and farther away from me until I could no longer see it, sense its presence. I didn't know why I was so…afraid? timid? ashamed? of death, I would have to go through it one day, and there was no way I could avoid it. Unless I wanted to become immortal, which wasn’t at all appealing. I had seen enough of the world, the way it was, and how complex yet so simple-minded and selfish humans could be…I didn't want to see any of that at all, any longer.

When I went through the unimaginable with Shane, what I thought about death changed – all because of him. And when I look back on it, I realize that it had been a good thing too – for it had saved his life, as well as mine. I had been childhood friends with him. As we grew up, I found myself falling in love with him, and him with me. We both went to our parents soon after we had confessed that we loved each other, without any regrets, doubts and fears, and requested to marry. Before long, we were bonded for life, and glad that we had decided to take a chance for us. Maybe it was because we knew that we didn't need "distance" to determine how close we were. In our eyes, it didn't exist. We would always feel the other person's presence, even if they weren't there with us, and we could be comforted. Shane and I didn't need that kind of reassurance – we already knew that no matter where we were, we would always feel there was no distance between us.

And life went on after we got married. It was a peaceful existence. Nature was always around us in some way, form or movement. Birds flew high above the dense canopy of trees; often we could hear their cheerful chirps and bursts of songs in the morning and evening. The river flowed steadily, occasionally splashing water. I smile as I remember the many times Shane and I had dunked each other underwater and tumbled around on the grassy banks.

All was normal, we believed. Until that fateful day arrived – when everything and everyone as I knew it, including Shane, would never be the same. And _I_ would never be the same either. Just thinking about it now brings a chill to me, and a feeling of extreme thankfulness in my heart.

For on that day, I had almost lost Shane.

It burns clearly in my mind, reminding me each second, each minute, each hour of every day how I nearly lost Shane to death. It never loses its grasp on me. Sometimes I relive the moment in my mind, an endless nightmare loop. I was seeing an illusion, a faint wisp of a dream that I still clung to. But I knew that wasn't true – what I had seen, felt and thought that day had _not_ been a mirage. 

I had been naively and joyfully picking out flowers for Shane in the forest, knowing that he would be ecstatic when I gave him a bouquet of wild roses. Meanwhile Shane had returned from a trip to the closest village, only to find that I wasn’t home. 

Wondering where I was, he searched for me in every hiding place and little corner until he found me in the forest. Worry etched on his face and remained there. He was upset at me, since he had thought up the worst case scenarios and here I was, causing him unneeded panic by wandering into the forest. For all he knew, I could have been mauled or killed by the wild beasts that resided here.

He leaned against a nearby oak tree and waited for me impatiently. I sensed that he was there and looked up, a wide grin spreading across my face. It slowly faded once I saw his frown.

I knew though that he wouldn't be angry for long. What he felt then was temporary fury, and once I gave him the lovely bouquet of flowers, he would blush wildly and smile at me, his anger quickly fading. Sadly, that didn't happen.

Suddenly his face froze, and he went pale. He looked fearfully at something on the ground and sucked in his breath. To my horror, he fell, a second becoming eternity. Getting up as fast as I could, I ran over to him. I also saw the slithery cobra escape – it had poisoned Shane. With a steadily sinking heart, I realized what this meant for him, what it meant for us. Somehow my shaking body managed to sit itself down. I lay his head in my lap, trying every way I could think of to get him to talk. But nothing helped – he could only give me a meaningful look, telling me not in words, but with his eyes, everything he was feeling right then.

He wanted me to save his life – he didn't want to die like this, lying helplessly in darkness with no hope of living. Very few people survived from a cobra bite, and I wished with all my mind, heart and soul he would be one of those few. If he died, how would I live? He was my other half; the one person in my life who never abandoned me. If he died, I died too. Slowly I shook myself free of the shock that had taken over me and became determined to do anything – even if it cost my life – to save Shane.

I would not let him die. When his family came to take his body, I refused to give him to them and prayed to every god I knew, hoping against hope that they would save him, or in the very least, figure out how to revive him. And to do that, I knew, I had to go to the place where death could not stop me.

That night a softly glowing light appeared before me. It turned out to be none other than Parvati, the goddess of Love. Surely, I thought, she would think of a way to make Shane live – she was my sole hope now. And she understood my pain, having gone through the same thing herself. She owed that to the people she loved and cared about. And as I had thought before, Parvati did find a way. She told me how to enter the netherworld and find Shane’s spirit. “Talking to the God of Death will not be easy," she told me. “You may have to bargain with him, otherwise he will not let you in.” With a bittersweet look on her face, she left, vanishing into thin air.

Soon I found myself in the murky and cold land of the dead, in the place where the spirits of people who had just died waited for their future, wondering where they would go. It was there that I found Shane’s spirit – but there was one problem. As Parvati had predicted, the guardians of the netherworld wouldn't let me talk to Shane. A heavy desperation enveloped me as I talked with them for a long time. Then that evaporated when Yama, the God of Death, appeared. He was impressed by how much I deeply loved Shane, and allowed him to live, on one condition.

“Shane’s exhausted his own life span,” Yama explained, “so the only way he can have a full life is to live what's left of yours, Kelsey.”

The only thing I could do was nod, telling him that yes, I wanted to, and yes, I meant it. And if I didn't, the gods could shoot me down then and there. 

I made it back to the mortal world, the feel of firm soil beneath my feet reminding me where I was, and – to my shock – Shane was alive! Alive and breathing, and smiling happily at me, glad that I had saved him. Now he didn't have a doomed fate to look forward to – only a new, blissful beginning.

After that, as the cliché ending goes, we lived happily for the rest of our lives.

I used to believe that death was formidable, something to be afraid of – but now I knew the truth. Death wasn't something to be feared, and I was not timid anymore. Death was something to be celebrated – since it didn't make a person stop living. It made them reborn.

And I was sure that Shane felt the same way.


End file.
